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Crawford County Prothonotary seeks pay raise for passport duties

MEADVILLE – A Crawford County elected official could be getting a significant pay raise. Emmy Arnett, Prothonotary for Crawford County is seeking additional compensation for her role in processing passport applications. Arnett has been doing passports ever since she took office five years ago, but she says demand has gone up in recent weeks since the Meadville Post Office discontinued that service.

“The Post Office is no longer doing passports, to my knowledge. It has created a significant increase in our revenue and our acceptance of applications within my office,” Arnett told Forever Broadcasting on Tuesday.

The measure Arnett proposed at Tuesday’s Crawford County Commissioner work session will probably be voted on at Thursday’s business meeting. It would designate Arnett as "Passport Application Acceptance Program Manager," a separate position with a job description distinct from prothonotary.

“I am the Chief Clerk of the civil division of the Court of Common Pleas. This is something that the commissioners have asked me to continue. And keep in mind, in a year’s time, I put 600 or more hours a year, just into this program alone. So, with that, they have asked me to create a program, which we have done, the HR Director and myself, to basically formalize it to being separate from the Prothonotary’s position,” Arnett said.

Along with the new position comes an additional 6-thousand dollar annual salary, to complement her current 60-thousand dollar income. The position is considered to be self-funded, coming entirely from passport application fees collected by the county.

If approved, Arnett would be making more than all three Crawford County Commissioners, who each earn a salary of 64-thousand, 522-dollars.

The courthouse has generated 106-thousand dollars in passport revenue since Arnett took office in 2008, and Arnett estimates revenue to increase significantly in years to come due to higher demand. Arnett estimates it takes anywhere from 20 to 25 minutes to process each passport application.